


Nourishment

by gardnerhill



Series: The Vermilion Problem [1]
Category: Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Community: watsons_woes, Gen, Other, Prompt Fic, Vampire Sherlock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-06
Updated: 2016-07-06
Packaged: 2018-07-22 01:02:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7412284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gardnerhill/pseuds/gardnerhill
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Watson makes a singular discovery about his new fellow lodger.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nourishment

**Author's Note:**

> For the 2016 July Watson's Woes Promptfest prompt #6, **Food, Glorious Food:** A crime/mystery/anecdote/scenario involving food. As complex or simple as you wish to make it.

I had not fed properly in so long, longer than any time in my recent history. That is the only reason I was so careless.

The lessening of crime around my old rooms in Montague Street (as will happen when the most violent mortals are bled dry and their corpses consigned to the Thames) was starting to attract notice; I had needed to move again. When Stamford introduced me to a fellow who also needed lodgings I was in such good spirits that I did not hesitate to sacrifice a precious drop of another’s blood running through my veins to complete my haemoglobin test; I knew that another venue and another population would soon have me well-fed again.

But my fascination with this new lodger distracted me. (It is a weakness, my interest in mortal humans; Mycroft castigates me for it constantly and warns that it will be my starvation. How often have I nearly proved him right.) What I had once thought a plain, uncomplicated soldier and physician, one who could not follow my deductions and would not see the signs of his fellow’s true nature, revealed himself as a man of quiet courage and grace despite his illness and recovery from his wound. He refused to complain about his affliction, and there was a familiar light in his eye when he espied my clients – curiosity, fascination. I began to entertain thoughts of including him in my work – then dismissed that as foolhardiness and my own sudden craving for more than warm living blood.

So between my work and my fellow lodger, I neglected to feed for days at a time. That was as foolish and dangerous as my desire to befriend John Watson, for the hungrier my cursed kind become the lower our brains sink, till we become mere mindless sharks or wolves tearing into all around us in the need to end the hunger. Yet still I stayed indoors one more night, and one more, and another, and another, trying to learn all I could about Watson and battling with my instinct to keep myself safe – even as I knew that if I did not feed soon I would not hesitate to subdue even Watson beneath me and drink his life.

The madness took my brain, and my one sane thought turned me away from the upstairs flight to his bedroom, and down into the scullery. Mrs. Hudson and her savage young marmalade cat had been keeping our lodgings lamentably free of rats and other blood-filled vermin that had assuaged me in the past in my old rooms when no hunting was to be found – but in the kitchen was her old, sickly dog, whining in pain from its cancer. Anticipating a quick meal that was also an act of mercy for a mortal beast, I seized the creature, which uttered only one last sigh and subsided as I slit its carotid with my front incisors.

Nothing can compare to the blood of humans in its depth and richness, its unctuous flow and solid heat, but this mouthful would keep my lodger safe. It was warm and nourishing and carried the beat of life into me with every swipe of my tongue across the open wound.

So enthralled was I with my first meal in days that I did not register the stillness of a nearby living creature until the candle-light in my face made me raise my head from the dead animal’s throat, blood still on my lips and my incisors clearly showing, and straight into Watson's appalled eyes.

In my long brutish existence I have been caught out during feeding more than once, and my solution was always the same – instant death for the witness.  Mere days earlier I would have seized Watson and tossed the dog aside for a proper meal at his jugular, drag the corpse to the river, flee into the night to find a place well out of London to dwell for a century until all who remembered me there were dust. More than once I have done so.

But for the first time in my centuries of existence I hesitated, just long enough for him to respond to me. He did not use blade nor oaken stake nor pistol loaded with silver shot, and that is what felled me.

Watson glared at me, terrified though he clearly was. “You _will_ tell me everything, sir.”

I stared into the eyes of a man who’d run through enemy fire to treat wounded men, who would not let a blood-drinking hellbeast in his own household teach him cowardice.

And what came out of my mouth was not a roar of hunger or savagery, but a low shaken tone. “Agreed.”

He looked me up and down, not in disgust but in curiosity though well-laced with fear, and sadness in his eyes at seeing old Skip in my grasp. “The poor creature is already done for, Holmes. You might as well finish your…work here.”

Now I knew what it was to feel fear. But for the first time I lowered my head and resumed my meal under the calm gaze of a living mortal. And an odd thread of amusement ran through me, for it was highly pragmatic of Watson to let a blood-drinker sate himself first.

When I was done – not sated on that little bit of thin stuff, but no longer dangerous – Watson had produced an old sheet and took the dog’s corpse from my arms to wrap it. “A neat job of it, if I may say such a thing. No bloodstains, no major lacerations. You feed with as little drama as does the vampire bat or mosquito.” He was clearly frightened but speaking as coolly as he must have reassured his patients whilst shells exploded around them on the field. “We can tell Mrs. Hudson that I found Skip’s body here during the night, which is only the truth, and removed it to the rubbish so poor Bridgid wouldn’t have to in the morning.”

That courage before me – bravery I have never seen equaled in the face or heart of a hundred monster-hunters throughout my time – opened my mouth. “I will never harm you, Watson. Not you, nor anyone human in this household.”

He twitched a little at the word that denoted my queerness. But his eyebrow arched and his moustache curled at one end. “I had little doubt of that, old fellow. The fact that we are all still alive does rather speak of your restraint.”

And we laughed, both of us, standing in the scullery, with my blood-teeth exposed and the dog I’d slain in his arms.

Other things happened that night; I preceded him upstairs to the parlour, we did not stop speaking until the sun was well risen, and Watson had learned more of my kind’s ways than any mortal ever had in history.

But it was that laugh that changed everything – that began my existence as a champion of justice and not merely a bored, observant opportunist who chose his profession so that he might take his unholy meals among the ranks of London’s violent criminals unnoticed. It began the first friendship I had ever made in centuries of cursed existence.

And the next time the police called on me – coincidentally, another case involving blood – for the first time I turned to my fellow lodger and casually asked Watson if he’d nothing better to do than accompany me to the crime scene. And with his bright, courageous presence at my side, something else within me began to receive nourishment.


End file.
